A Look Inside California’s New Workplace Laws

This year, there are a handful of new workplace laws that will impact all business owners—including those in the commercial real estate industry. The most impactful of these laws is a construction contractor liability law that requires general contractors take wage and benefit liability for the employees of its subcontractors; however, there are several other laws that could prove to have an impact as well. We sat down with Dwayne McKenzie, a partner at Cox, Castle & Nicholson to find out about those other laws, the impetus behind them and how they might impact business owners.

GlobeSt.com: Earlier we talked about the new construction contractor liability law, AB1701. Now, lets look at a few of the other new workplace laws, starting with immigration worksite enforcement actions, AB 450.

McKenzie: This is another step in a further extension of some immigrant protective legislation that we have seen over the last couple of years, and some relationship to concern about immigration enforcement actions with the new federal administration. The statute is trying to require that employers don’t cooperate any more than is required on federal immigration enforcement action. There are also further steps that employers must take to keep employees informed of those investigations. Really, this is meant to protect the overall rights of their employees.